If the target yelps - you know your aim was good.

Reactions to a published book can be surprising. Mine was an eyewitness description of bush administration in Papua New Guinea (PNG) between its pivotal pre-Self Government general election in 1972 and full Independence in September 1975.

Despite being born in Northumberland I had worked as a “kiap”, a bush administrator employed by Australia’s Department of External Affairs, over that critical period – hence its title “The Northumbrian Kiap”.

I had also been trained as a journalist so felt confident about being able to assemble a text that was informative, accurate and sharp.

The first draft was written in 1977, while my memory was fresh, then set aside while I pursued my career.

It re-emerged in 2016 and formed the basis of roughly eighty per cent of the final text which was published just over three years in 2018.

The book is unusual because there are few people living with first hand experience of colonial administration and not surprisingly it has also generated interest in PNG itself.

Reaction there has been surprisingly mixed. Many Papua New Guineans and fellow kiaps of my service generation have said they like it.

However many senior kiaps, and some Australian settlers with long PNG connections, have made it clear they do not.

They think its tone is arrogant, even insolent, and in the case of the latter have said it was presumptuous of me to write about the country after living there such a short time (1968-75).

One reason for senior kiap angst is that I was not always polite about some of the former Department of District Administration’s higher ranking staff.

However, even though I was also critical of some early generation PNG politicians, many Papua New Guineans with positions within the country’s current top ranks have made their appreciation clear.

They include Oro Provincial Governor Gary Juffa MP, London’s High Commissioner Winnie Kiap, nationally recognised author Daniel Kumbon and Dr Kevin Pamba of Divine Word University which has secured exclusive distribution rights for the book within PNG itself.

Mr Juffa underlines the contribution “The Northumbrian Kiap” makes to an understanding of the radical administrative adjustment which dogged the period immediately before national independence, Winnie Kiap likes its empathetic descriptions of village people and village life, and Daniel praises its honesty.

Most of the junior kiaps who were the same generation as myself appreciate that honesty too.

It’s this trait which has got me into deep water with some former kiaps who were once my seniors.

Ours was a hierarchical department and old disciplines must die hard because even now, when none of us are below pension age, some former top office holders are still clinging to their former pre-eminence.

Their common theme is that I was so junior I was impudent to write such a book. This morphs into assertions the book must be worthless because my service had no length at all – a sentiment mirrored by some settlers with longstanding PNG connections too.

One former kiap, who was working at in an office in the country’s capital city at the time, has even claimed that my disbelieving description of provincial Assistant District Commissioner ADC shepherding his staff to Self-Government Day celebration safety behind an arsenal of guns could not have happened because reports of the incident did not cross his desk.

Despite this criticism the book has not been revised. So if you would like read an unvarnished description of colonial administration in the second half of the 20th Century, as well as descriptive accounts of daily life in the wonderful country of PNG, you should click onto View selected item on Amazon.com.au (Australia) , if you live in Australia, if you are in PNG you should email Dr Kevin Pamba on [email protected] , and if, like myself you live in the UK click https://www.amazon.co.uk ? Northumbrian-Kiap-administration-self-governi... I hope you enjoy your reading.

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